The present invention relates generally to alarm systems, and more particularly to an improved alarm system designed to protect from theft of items stored within a premises.
Alarm systems for doors and other accessways in restaurants, warehouses, and the like, generally fall into two categories. The first category includes those alarms designed to protect from unauthorized entry to the premises. Such alarms may be activated by opening the door or window, by breaking a beam of light, by sensing motion etc.
Alarms of the second category are designed to protect from unauthorized removal of merchandise from the premises. These types of alarms may be similar to those mentioned above. Additionally, this second category includes alarm systems wherein a magnetic or other device is attached to the merchandise and a sensor placed at each exit of the building. When an item is carried past the sensor, an alarm is activated. Authorized removal of the merchandise from the premises is facilitated by deactivation or removal of the magnetic or other device from the merchandise. Only authorized persons are given devices for deactivating or removing the magnetic or other devices from the merchandise.
Certain types of business suffer from "internal pilferage." That is to say, there is a high incidence of theft, by employees, of the goods or products stored or handled by the business. This is an especially serious problem in businesses where there is a significant amount of traffic through the building entrances and exits and where it is difficult if not impossible to monitor the activities of all employees. The problem for some business is compounded when the goods or merchandise cannot be tagged with magnetic or other sensors, and/or when there is a very high turnover of the goods or merchandise.
As an example, consider a restaurant. The restaurant handles many food items in their precooked or preprepared condition. These items must be brought through a service entrance from delivery trucks or the like and stored on the premises for later use. Although service entrances are, as a general rule, locked from the outside, they generally are unlocked from the inside. Unsupervised employees and others having access to the inside of the premises could abscond with the stored food items through the service entrance. These losses represent a real and significant impairment to a restaurant s business. The stolen food items are not on hand when needed. Further, the losses from theft of goods seriously affect the revenue of the restaurant.
What is required in the art, and heretofore unavailable, is an alarm system capable of allowing a select number of people to control traffic through service entrances to a business premises. The alarm must be capable of recognizing authorized versus unauthorized entry or exit from the premises, and sound a Klaxon or otherwise indicate when such entry or exit is unauthorized. Further, the system must be able to accommodate for routine deliveries by allowing the service entrance to remain open long enough for the delivery to be made but not long enough to allow an errant employee to make off with goods from the premises and return unnoticed.